Description

Over the past half century, Gerhard Richter (born 1932) has built up a stylistically heterogeneous and conceptually complex body of painting, photography, sculpture and artist's books that firmly establishes his status as the most important living artist of our time: today, this diverse oeuvre totals in excess of 3,000 individual works. Now, on the occasion of the artist's eightieth birthday in February 2012, we are delighted to announce volume one of the Gerhard Richter catalogue raisonné--the first of a projected five volumes, to be issued over the next seven years. Edited by Dietmar Elger, director of the Gerhard Richter Archive at the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, who has spent years researching and preparing the publication, this first volume encompasses the works Richter assigned numbers 1 to 198, which span the years 1962 to 1968. A total of 385 paintings and sculptures are listed, more than 30 of which were previously unseen or even unknown. Alongside more than 400 full-color plates (many of them full-page) and nearly 100 black and white plates, it includes full technical specifications, information about the artist's handwritten notes, and the provenance, bibliography and exhibitions for each individual work. This information is further supplemented by commentary, quotations from the artist and comparison images.